Many farmers are worried if they will make it to the end of 2025 amid a perfect storm of issues, including the 'disastrous' inheritance tax proposals, the NFU has warned.
The union has used its conference today (25 February) to call on the government to reset its relationship with farmers, as many businesses are 'still reeling' after the budget.
And bad policy, worsening geopolitics and unprecedented weather have left some sectors of UK farming in the worst cashflow crisis for generations, the NFU said.
Other pressing issues include the 'botched' post-Brexit agricultural transition, as the 'very building blocks of the new ELMs system aren’t working'.
All of these issues are preventing investment and growth on farms across the UK – 'a key mission for this government'.
However, the inheritance tax proposals, announced in the autumn budget, is the issue which 'overshadows all else'.
The government plans to reform agricultural property relief (APR), which will mean that farms worth over £1m will incur a 20% inheritance tax charge from April 2026.
In his opening address to hundreds of farmers, NFU president Tom Bradshaw said: "However hard things are, we must meet the challenges ahead.
“There were only 87 words in Labour’s manifesto about farming, but some of those words gave us hope for the future; policies on imports, binding targets for British food for the public sector, a recognition that food security is national security.
“We recognise these are still early days for a new government, but new ministers had hardly found their way to their offices when they broke their first promise.
"And it’s one which overshadows all else, wiping out our ability to plan, to invest and, often, to hope. It hangs over our farms, our families, our futures: the family farm tax.
“This policy is morally wrong. I have received hundreds of desperate messages, taken hundreds of panicked calls."
Mr Bradshaw said the IHT policy is also economically wrong, as the claim made by Treasury that 73% of farmers will be unaffected 'has long been debunked'.
It’s not just the NFU that thinks the figures are wrong - all major opposition parties have said so, as well as the CBI and even Labour's own taxi advisers, he said.
"All of the UK’s major supermarkets have called for the government to pause and consult," Mr Bradshaw pointed out.
He concluded his speech calling on the government to reset its relationship with farmers, where Labour 'faces up to the reality of how much the industry is struggling.'
"Many farmers are genuinely worried about how they’ll make it to the end of 2025," the NFU president warned.
